Image-Guided Surgical e-Learning in the Post-COVID-19 Pandemic Era: What Is Next?

Abstract

The current unprecedented coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) crisis has accelerated and enhanced e-learning solutions. During the so-called transition phase, efforts were made to reorganize surgical services, reschedule elective surgical procedures, surgical research, academic education, and careers to optimize results. The intention to switch to e-learning medical education is not a new concern. However, the current crisis triggered an alarm to accelerate the transition. Efforts to consider e-learning as a teaching and training method for medical education have proven to be efficient. For image-guided therapies, the challenge requires more effort since surgical skills training is combined with image interpretation training, thus the challenge is to cover quality educational content with a balanced combination of blended courses (online/onsite). Several e-resources are currently available in the surgical scenario; however, further efforts to enhance the current system are required by accelerating the creation of new learning solutions to optimize complex surgical education needs in the current disrupted environment.

Knowledge Translation in the Healthcare Sector. A Structured Literature Review

“…The impact of new technologies like mixed and augmented reality, artificial intelligence, robotics, big data analytics are affecting several medical disciplines, changing the way surgery, diagnosis, and treatments are performed (Dal Mas, Piccolo and Ruzza, 2020;Dal Mas et al, 2020b;Dal Mas et al, 2019b;Giulianotti et al, 2003;Presch et al, 2020).Innovation involves not only new medical equipment and instruments but also clinical protocols, like in the case of oncology (Cobianchi et al, 2016;Hogan et al, 2012;Vitolo et al, 2019). Medical doctors and clinical staff require new skills and training methods (Garcia Vazquez et al, 2020), and blended curricula are leading to new professional figures, like technical physicians (Groenier, Pieters, and Miedema, 2017). Several budget reductions, especially in developed countries (Massaro, Dumay, and Garlatti, 2015) make it difficult to cope with the increasing request for outpatient and inpatient services by an ageing population (Howdon and Rice, 2018) with more chronic diseases (Miceli et al, 2017).…”

The Potential of Big Data Research in HealthCare for Medical Doctors’ Learning

“…A co-learning approach is highly recommended to make the best possible use of the modern solutions available to all the stakeholders involved. Medical images represent today a frontier approach to diagnosis and treatment, including surgery [ 14 , 57 ]. Again, the understanding of medical images requires dedicated training.…”

“…Even though HCO decision-makers, administrators, and department heads recognise the importance of appropriate education in terms of technology and data management for MDs [ 14 ], continuing education and skills development in Big Data is often forgotten. While some professions call for continued education to meet Big Data needs and requirements, MDs are still not in the spotlight in terms of receiving that advanced training that can play a decisive role in earlier disease intervention, reduced probability of adverse reactions to drugs, less medical errors, determination of causalities, understanding of co-morbidity, and many other challenges [ 9 ].…”

“…It is the responsibility of the professional to keep abreast of technological changes and relevant medical knowledge [ 16 , 22 ]. In this perspective, more and more e-learning options are available, with an increasing number of attendees, especially during the COVID pandemic crisis [ 14 , 34 ].…”

Planning the Full Recovery Phase

“…New paradigms in surgical and emergency education could be rethought, even using online and e-sources. 15 Despite the higher management costs, barbell strategies proved to be the winning choice in times of crisis.…”